Jerry Seinfeld – Manchester – The King of Comedy’s In Town

Tonight is a special night for our city – quite possibly the funniest, most successful and cleverest stand-up comedian of our time is in town! Jerry Seinfeld is in a league of his own and it is a huge treat for us Mancunians that he’s playing his first ever UK gigs outside of London here in Manchester and (last night) Birmingham.

Manchester should be a fun experience for Jerry – we have chutzpah up here! We are more ‘Brooklyn’ than Manhattan, so to speak, and we have a warmth and earthiness that naturally responds to Jerry Seinfeld’s famous, razor-sharp observations about relationships, our very human inadequacies and of course, the clutter of modern life.

He is HUGELY popular in our Jewish community too – I live in Prestwich (with its massive Jewish community) and just about everyone I have spoken to this week has asked, “You going to Jerry Seinfeld Collette… can you get me a free ticket?” (I’m joking!)

Likewise, as an Irish-Catholic, I can say his humour reaches all cultures, creeds and ‘funny-buttons’. He can fill arenas all over the world – I was in Las Vegas recently and a huge 50ft poster advertising his forthcoming show there dominates the ‘strip’ – he is literally comedy ‘royalty’.

Seinfeld has hinted that he is soon to be winding down his huge arena shows and returning to small, more intimate venues as, he says, he doesn’t want to be doing stand-up in front of tens of thousands in his 60s. Fair enough, but without him, as the king of arena stand-up, I’d say, we wouldn’t have seen the success that Peter Kay or McIntyre have experienced in recent years.

Like many going tonight, I was first introduced to Jerry Seinfeld back in the 90s, thanks to the brilliant Seinfeld TV series, and was instantly hooked. Conversations with fellow addicts would involve lots of ‘in-jokes’ all week long based on the most recent episode we’d watched. Over the years, I have often used the ‘Seinfeld test‘ on potential dates as a way of working out if we’d share a similar sense of humour…! If they liked Seinfeld, I’d stay for pudding!

Ok, can you tell I am excited??!! If you are going tonight, enjoy. And if not, make sure you get to see him soon – it is a real treat. I read in an article recently that Jerry was a little nervous about how his jokes and delivery would go down with the Manchester ‘patois’… which is pretty funny in itself!

We’re in for fun tonight peeps …and don’t worry Jerry, we won’t give you a hard time. I cannot say the same for you….